Sailor Moon theories ☽

Why Cosmos (Probably) Isn't Usagi

Original post: http://sailorfailures.tumblr.com/post/42424740909/why-cosmos-probably-isnt-usagi
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Sailor Cosmos is often regarded as Sailor Moon's biggest mystery. Who is she really? What situation forced her to travel back in time and attempt what she did? To what kind of battle is she returning? And in most cases, this is intentional. She is supposed to be ambiguous and there is no definitive answer for who she is.
Which is why it's so irritating when people say "Oh, she's Usagi's future self", as though it's a simple and clear answer. Could she be Usagi? Sure, it's possible - just not that probable.

Why do people think she is Usagi's future self?

Mistranslations, mostly. Misinterpretations of certain sections of the manga that get telephone-game'd down through fansites and forums until everyone just accepts it as canon. It becomes so ingrained in so many fans that they react quite strongly when you hold it up to the light and say, hey, this doesn't quite make sense.
The biggest culprit is a mistranslation/misinterpretation where people believe Cosmos says "I am the future Sailor Moon" and/or "I am the future you". In reality, it was much more ambiguous than that. Cosmos's dialogue took advantage of a lot of the ambiguity of the Japanese language and is largely metaphorical. The only concrete thing she actually said was akin to "I am a future Sailor Moon". This puts it into a completely different light, especially when you consider that "Sailor Moon" is a title and not just Usagi.

Why is it so unlikely that she is Usagi?

First of all, Cosmos comes from the distant future, a time much, much farther than the 30th Century, and the reign of Neo Queen Serenity. But we know that in the 30th Century, Usagi has lost the power to transform into Sailor Moon, because she no longer has her Star Seed; the magical crystal inside every Sailor Soldier that makes them a Sailor Soldier - in Usagi's case, that's the Silver Crystal. Where has it gone? Into Chibi-Usa, of course. Our precocious Small Lady is set to become the next Sailor Moon when her mother's ready to retire. You really think she's going to keep calling herself "chibi" forever?
So Usagi can no longer transform into Sailor Moon; which makes any theories that "Sailor Cosmos" is just another powerup like "Eternal Sailor Moon" much more complicated. Why did she suddenly take back her Star Seed? What happened to Chibi-Usa? Did she get another one? From whom? How is she still 'Sailor Moon' if she is not using the moon's Star Seed? At some point, the loopholes you need to leap through to draw the conclusion that Cosmos = Usagi is more trouble than just assuming they are different people.
Second, Usagi has actually met her future self before. In the Black Moon arc, she meets, briefly, with Neo Queen Serenity. Why briefly? Because meeting yourself is kind of a no-no as far as the space-time continuum is concerned. They knew that they couldn't spend more than a few minutes in the same place before things started to unravel, and even then they were taking a huge risk.
Cosmos spends an entire arc hanging out with Usagi in the disguise of Chibi Chibi. No unraveling. No meltdown of the timeline. It wasn't even mentioned as a concern. You can make loopholes around the Star Seed problem, but this is much harder to sweep under the rug. The canon has already established that the same person cannot exist twice in the same time, in close proximity, for very long, or else it's bad news. So how did Chibi Chibi manage to chill out at the Tsukino house for all that time? Disguised as her little sister, even? Kind of makes you think of Chibi-Usa, doesn't it...?

Really, Cosmos is much more likely to be like Chibi-Usa; a descendent of Usagi (thus "a future Sailor Moon") who travels back in time and bonds with her ancestor. But even that is just one of countless valid interpretations.

So what do we know?

Not much. As established, Cosmos is an intentionally vague character. There are only two things we know for certain; that she is a future Sailor Moon, and that she is not Usagi's second child. It is established within the canon that Usagi/NQS can only have one child, and that's Chibi-Usa.
This is why it is so frustrating to see people dismiss her by saying that she's nothing more than another powerup to Usagi. Her intrigue is that she could be anybody. Yes, it is possible that she is Usagi, but it's just as possible that she's Shingo from the future after he fell into a cursed hot springs.
So when planning out your own personal Cosmos theory, keep in mind that Usagi loses her Star Seed long before Cosmos exists, that hanging out with a past/future form of yourself for extended periods of time is kind of dangerous, and that everyone's theories are just as valid as your own.

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